I Love You More
by AlthaeaRosea
Summary: Gothel's feeling for her flower and the little girl


my first tangled fic and my third fic in english!

oh, i just love the movie! it has the charm disney classics have, don't you think?

i'm 15 and i've watched the movie for 6 times! still awed by the lanterns and cry at eugene's death part. i think i've fallen in love with eugene lol.

i know the fic is bad and short and shallow. i just couldn't really get gothel's personality. oh well, gotta keep running around here and there to collect angpao so i didn't have enough time for this poor piece. but i have to post it now or i shall just leave it alone forever in my documents file.

so, here's my fic. enjoy. please review and tell me my mistakes, kay?

...

Ancient people dug yams from the inside of the earth and ate them. No one considered that as stealing. But, for the sake of my fragile heart, it happened when neat's leather was the latest fashion. Centuries passed before my bright eyes, and trust me, I had seen horrible thieveries. They were everywhere like sunshine that never earned the privilege to copulate the soil and gave a soul some delight.

I was a woman with determination like fire which was never big enough to burn and kill another side of my womanly self, the costume I mostly wear during my recess in my comfort zone, my passive nature. That was how I kept myself and my precious flower untouched by civilization. That way the time shall never had its hand on my youth and beauty. Until one day they stole it. They dug the ground and took it away from my poor soon-to-be-wrinkled hands. I never kidnapped the princess. I only repossessed which was mine at the first place.

She was just a little sapling. The world was yet to touch her after a long while. The only way to keep the former usage of the flower, I knew I had to take her soul far from the world's reach. To make her fully became mine. To make the flower fully became mine, like how it used to be.

She was fragile as a flower. Her yarn ball-like hands on the middle of the night's whistling breeze portrayed only vulnerability and feebleness. I could do nothing but to stare in awe and promptly gave the rubber nipple for her to satisfy her seems-like-eternal hunger with milk. Then she would belch a couple of time and fell asleep in my motherly arms. That was the time I realized that the famous maternal instinct had gotten inside my stoic heart. I wondered if the flower could find the difference in gentleness between the queen's hug and mine. That questions kept ringing in my head, making a jealousy feeling only felt by amateur lovers who never really understood the meaning of the sacred thing they boasted in.

I taught her how to read, write, count, and other basic things they taught at schools. The way she proudly painted a delicate flower for me on the wall, that was less compared to my pride at her. She was a beautiful little lass with marked hands. I polished all that with decent manners through a couple of real practices and proper books. She caught do-re-mi like a hungry lion snapped at a piece of meat. I must proudly add that the candles that surrounded our dim towers were born through her valiant hands.

"Mother, can I have another bottle of white paint?"

"Mother, look, I drew you a sunshine!"

"Mother, we'll call him Pascal. Don't you think that name sounds like giggles?"

"Oh, Mother, we're having hazelnut soup for dinner? What a surprise! I love you!"

"Mother, if I make you a lovely vase, would you teach me to play chess?"

"Mother, what's the meaning of this word? Something wonderful? Oh, I love this book!"

"Mother, I really really really love you! More than I love Pascal!"

When only the dim tower with warming firelight were all we could see, so began the ritual of which the reason she was with me. Her voice joined the empty space that was never empty, resonated inside the sound world that hugged her pleasantly yet binding her so tightly. At those moments I had everything all women were yearning for. A daughter. Youth. Beauty. I couldn't decide what was most precious.

"Mother, what are those lights?"

"They are stars, honey."

"They're beautiful."

"Rapunzel, why don't you go to the kitchen and check the potatoes for me? I don't want them to be too flabby."

"Yes, Mother."

Her awareness towards the lanterns started it all. It brought fear into me. The fear was served with suspicion and distrust. She asked harmful questions based on curiosity. I replied with twirling lies and unnecessary questions. That pattern started to dominate our conversations and it sure stressed me out. But it didn't keep her from asking more questions. Had I told you that I failed to plant sensitivity into her explosive mind? I had now.

"Rapunzel, you are nowhere to be save except in this tower. Understand?"

"Yes, Mother. But look at that funny little flower down there! I'm sure spring has finally sprung. Can we have a picnic down there? That won't do me any harm, will it?"

"Rapunzel, I'm sure you understand what I just said. End of conversation."

Then she would act sad and ask the same question the day afterward. That little brat was starting to cut off my patience. An inch a day. It continued until years. And one tranquil night I found myself looking at 'my daughter', seeing only her hair, my magic flower. No longer a young lass I loved. But I swore, that moment I was still trying to love her as a girl I took advantage from.

The long-expected event came with the singing of a bird, whose ancestor's chirps accompanied me teaching Rapunzel A-B-C. I lost control of anger and realized that acting to love her was a burden heavier than ever. If it wasn't for the magic hair, she wouldn't be eating the food I cooked. Unlike the classic Snow White tale, I detested her not because of the ripeness of her appearance, but the ripeness of her character and wit.

You knew the rest of the story. The stolen tiara, the wanted thief, the lanterns, and my part as an antagonist. If you thought it might broke my heart after knowing what happened before the tangled tale started, you were wrong, dear. 'Oh, a little, most secret part of her heart must be bleeding seeing that cross blondie being so stubborn, forcing her to use a bit violence here and there'. Please stop being too melodramatic. Living for centuries had demolished that womanly part of me.

The road reached the end at that very moment the wanted thief cut my flower off the root. It was the time I knew all the love I used to have towards the girl and the cruel maternal instinct were nothing but mere illusions. But a second before centuries were taken away from my now-mortal body, I heard a blessed child voice.

_Flower gleam and glow, let your power shine_

_Make the clock reverse, bring back what once was mine_

_Heal what has been hurt, change the fate's design_

_Save what has been lost, bring back what once was mine_

_What once was mine_

_I always loved you more, Mother _

Then I joined the empty space that was never empty.

...

you know, i never really hated mother gothel. just look at how gentle she looked at young rapunzel. it was motherly.

she was just a lonely woman who received wrong education at her youth.


End file.
